How do I work out whether coaching will pay for itself?

Divide the year-one cost of the coach by the number of jobs you deliver in a year. That's how much more each job has to bring in, through better pricing, better clients or less of your own time, for the coaching to pay for itself in cash. Then set that bar beside what standing still is costing you, written in your own numbers.

How long does a video business coach take to pay off?

Real deployment, real systems and the growth that follows take 9 to 18 months. Anyone promising a fundamental reshape in 30 days is selling something else. With a coach who runs month to month, the cash at risk at any point is the month you're in.

Field Guides / Coaching

Is a video business coach worth it

A video business coach is worth it when the cost of another year without change, written in your own numbers, is bigger than a year of fees, and you'll do the work between calls. Before you speak to any coach, work out the break-even bar: a year of fees divided by the jobs you deliver in a year tells you how much more each job has to earn. Judge the result over 9 to 18 months, not 30 days.

Download this guide as a PDF

Why is "is a coach worth it" so hard to answer?

Whether a coach is worth it is hard to answer because most owners compare the fee against zero, as if staying as you are costs nothing. Staying as you are has a price as well. It never arrives as an invoice.

It shows up as quotes that leave money on the table, work that arrives only when a referral happens to land, and a business that stops when you stop. I ran my own production company for about a decade. In the early 2010s it turned over about £250,000 a year, and it finished within about ten grand of that figure every year while I avoided hiring.

The other half of the difficulty is that the fee is certain and the return isn't. No coach can promise your number, and you should be wary of one who does. What you can work out is the bar the coaching has to clear, and whether you're the kind of owner who clears it.

How to work out whether a coach is worth it: the method, step by step

The method is three sums and one question, and every number comes from your own business. There are no promised returns in here.

Write down what standing still costs you. Use your own words, with a figure wherever you can find one. If you can't write anything down, that's an answer too: coaching rarely sticks when nothing is pressing on you.

Copy and paste: the cost of standing still

If nothing changes in the next 12 months, the thing that worries me most is: [your answer]

Jobs last year I know I underquoted: [number], by roughly $[amount] each

Hours a week I spend on work someone else could do: [hours]

Revenue this year: $[amount]. Last year: $[amount]. The year before: $[amount]

The date by which this has to be different: [date]

Price a year of coaching, all in. Take the monthly fee times twelve and add anything charged up front. The guide to what video business coaching costs has a sheet for comparing several coaches this way.
Turn the year into a bar per job. Divide the year-one cost by the number of jobs you deliver in a year. That's how much more each job has to bring in, through better pricing, better clients or less of your own time, for the coaching to pay for itself in cash.

Copy and paste: the break-even bar

Year-one cost of the coach: $[amount]

Jobs I deliver in a year: [number]

Extra each job has to earn: $[year-one cost ÷ jobs]

As a share of my average job of $[average job value]: [extra ÷ average job × 100]%

Set the bar beside the cost of standing still. If the leaks you wrote down are larger than the bar, the sums favour doing something. If they're smaller, they don't, and no coach should argue you out of that.
Answer the question the sums can't. Will you do the work between calls? Write down one thing you changed because of the last course or programme you paid for. If there's nothing, find out why before you buy the next one.

A worked example

Here's the sum for a made-up business in round numbers. It isn't a promised result.

The owner turns over $300,000 a year across 30 jobs, so the average job is $10,000. The coach charges $1,700 a month with nothing up front.

The sum	Round numbers
Year-one coaching cost ($1,700 × 12)	$20,400
Jobs a year	30
Extra each job has to earn	$680
As a share of a $10,000 job	6.8%

If the worksheet shows three jobs last year that went out $2,000 under what the work needed, that's $6,000 of the $20,400 identified in one line, before counting the hours. The sums show whether the bar is within reach. They can't show whether the owner will do the work to reach it. With a coach who runs month to month, the cash at risk at any point is the month you're in.

The mistakes owners make when weighing up a coach

Three mistakes skew the sums, in both directions.

Leaving your own hours out. A low fee with a long course library can cost more in time than a higher fee with one call a week.
Expecting the return inside a quarter. Real deployment, real systems and the growth that follows take 9 to 18 months. Anyone promising a fundamental reshape in 30 days is selling something else.
Buying agreement. If you're hoping someone will approve a plan you've already made, a coach is an expensive way to get it.

Who is the Elite Boardroom not for?

The Elite Boardroom isn't for owners who can't yet write down what standing still costs them, or who want agreement more than direction. Nor is it for:

Owners below about $150,000 a year whose job is still getting work in the door. That's the baseline, not the test, and the free Field Guides cover the early fundamentals.
Owners who will attend the calls but not do the work between them.
Owners who need to win the argument when they're challenged.
Anyone looking for a course library to work through alone.

How the Elite Boardroom works, in brief

The Elite Boardroom is $1,700 USD a month, flat, with no application, no onboarding fee and no minimum term. Month one is the fit test, and it runs both ways. There are no refunds, and because you can cancel anytime, the only month at risk is the one you're in. Your rate stays the same for as long as you stay a member. Over eight years and more than 178 clients, VBA members have generated more than $52M in additional revenue, with average growth of around $292K in 18 months and an average membership of 27 months. Those are averages across the client base, not a forecast for your business. More on the video business coach page.

The rule of thumb for whether a coach is worth it

A coach is worth it when the cost of standing still, in your own numbers, is bigger than the break-even bar, and you act on what you hear within days. Benchmark: divide a year of fees by your jobs a year, and judge the result over 9 to 18 months. If you're unsure about timing, read when a production company is ready for a coach.

Hold yourself accountable

Which of these have you taken on or put in place recently?

You've filled in the cost-of-standing-still worksheet with last year's real figures.
You know the year-one cost and the minimum term of every coach you're considering.
You've worked out your break-even bar per job.
You can point to one thing you changed because of the last course or coach you paid for.

Your one move this week

What's the one thing you can commit to implementing this week? If you're not sure, start here.

Fill in the cost-of-standing-still worksheet with last year's figures, then work out the break-even bar for one coach you're considering. It takes under an hour, and it answers the question for any coach, me included.

One thing executed every week creates 50 strategic moves a year.

Questions like these come up regularly on our weekly Elite Boardroom calls. If you'd like someone to hold you to account each week, and to learn from a group of peers who run video businesses too, the Boardroom is for you.